Sustainable Life

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Man Kills Himself Holding 'Tax The 1%' in Front of Capitol-and Nobody Hears About It. When 64-year-old Vietnam vet John Constantino burned himself to death on the DC Mall in October of 2013 I couldn’t stop thinking about this man and his act.

Who was he? What compelled him? What was his life’s story? What were his political views, his life’s station, etc? I wanted to write a blog then but didn’t.
The Likely Cause of Addiction Has Been Discovered, and It Is Not What You Think. Philips 60W Equivalent LED (model 9290011350) Preview. Guardian Media Group to divest its £800m fund from fossil fuels. The Guardian Media Group (GMG) is to sell all the fossil fuel assets in its investment fund of over £800m, making it the largest yet known to pull out of coal, oil and gas companies.

The decision was justified on both financial and ethical grounds, said Neil Berkett, GMG chair: “It is a hard-nosed business decision, but it is influenced by the values of our organisation. It is a holistic decision taking into account all of those things.” Berkett said fossil fuel assets had performed relatively poorly in recent years and were threatened by future climate change action, while an ethical fund already held by GMG had been a “stellar” performer and renewable energy was growing strongly.
New Report Shows Australia Is Missing Out On Global Renewable Energy Boom. Solar, wind power aid unprecedented halt in global emissions. The International Energy Agency has hailed a “surprising” and “unprecedented” halt in the rise of global carbon dioxide emissions – an event it directly credits to the growth in solar and wind power, increased hydro, and the decline in coal-fired generation.

The IEA says global CO2 emissions stood at 32.3 billion tonnes in 2014, unchanged from the preceding year, despite a 3 per cent increase in global economic growth. It says this is the first time in 40 years in which there was a halt or reduction in emissions of greenhouse gases that was not tied to an economic downturn such as the global financial crisis. Specifically, the IEA attributes the halt in emissions growth to changing patterns of energy consumption in China and OECD countries, and the growing use of renewables, particularly solar and wind power – which are now beginning to have a real impact on energy emissions.
Global warming 'set to speed up to rates not seen for 1,000 years'

People need to brace themselves for accelerating climate change that could alter the way we live even over short time scales, scientists have warned.

New evidence suggests the rate at which temperatures are rising in the northern hemisphere could be 0.25C per decade by 2020 - a level not seen for at least 1,000 years.
Electric cars could cut oil imports 40% by 2030, says study. Electric cars could cut the UK’s oil imports by 40% and reduce drivers’ fuel bills by £13bn if deployed on a large scale, according to a new study.

An electric vehicle surge would deliver an average £1,000 of fuel savings a year per driver, and spark a 47% drop in carbon emissions by 2030, said the Cambridge Econometrics study. The paper, commissioned by the European Climate Foundation, said that air pollutants such as nitrogen oxide and particulates would be all but eliminated by mid-century, with knock-on health benefits from reduced respiratory diseases valued at over £1bn.
MIT scientists create new method to detect the origins of methane.

An MIT-led team of researchers has developed an instrument capable of quickly and accurately analyzing samples of methane, pinpointing how they were formed.

The breakthrough could give scientists a greater understanding of the role the gas plays in global warming. Methane is a potent force in global warming. It is second only to carbon dioxide when it comes to trapping heat inside the atmosphere for extended periods of time, and can originate from a range of different sources, including lakes, livestock and natural gas pipelines.
Passivhaus-certified straw homes claimed to cut fuel bills by 90 percent - Images. A house made from straw didn't work out so well in The Three Little Pigs, but maybe it's not such a bad idea after all.

Sustainable building firm BaleHaus recently unveiled a number of new energy-efficient Passivhaus-certified homes that feature a prefabricated straw insulation system, and promise a heating bill 90 percent lower than that of an average home. View all BaleHaus is a group comprised of three firms: Cadan Developments, ModCell (responsible for the straw insulation), and White Design. The homes completed so far come in a number of shapes and sizes, including three-bedroom terraced townhouses and one-bedroom apartments, proving the versatility of the straw building system.

6 companies doing the most to stop deforestation. In an eco-twist on the Forbes 500, the UK-based think tank Global Canopy Programme has launched the Forest 500, a ranking of how effectively companies and organizations are working to stop global deforestation.

Stopping deforestation has been identified as one of the cheapest and most effective means of fighting our current climate change trajectory. However, the issue is made complicated by a number of factors, such as the global demand for tropical products as well as illegal activities. So, who’s doing the most to stop it? While well-intentioned consumers may seek to avoid products like palm oil and beef, the product chains that tie our food, paper and clothes to tropical forests are decidedly tangled.

That’s where Forest 500 steps in. A total of 250 companies were ranked, with just six companies scoring the maximum number of points for responsibly sourced forest products.
Learn to love the pigginess of a pig, says America's farmer rockstar Joel Salatin. If ever there was a rockstar farmer, it has to be American Joel Salatin.

He is the poster boy for the alternative food movement and draws annual crowds in Australia – farmers and tree changers alike – to hear his version of the “land-healing” gospel. From his website: “We are in the redemption business: healing the land, healing the food, healing the economy, and healing the culture.”